Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the play’s treatment of alcohol addiction and anti-gay bias.

“But one thing I don’t have is the charm of the defeated, my hat is still in the ring, and I am determined to win!

 —What is the victory of a cat on a hot tin roof?

—I wish I knew...Just staying on it, I guess, as long as she can.”

This is the first instance in which Maggie refers to herself as a cat on a hot tin roof. The phrase represents the difficulties she has faced, including her childhood in poverty and loveless marriage to Brick, as well as her determination to persevere. She refuses to give up her dream of being married to a wealthy plantation owner.

“When something is festering in your memory or your imagination, laws of silence don’t work, it’s just like shutting a door and locking it on a house on fire in hope of forgetting that the house is burning. But not facing a fire doesn’t put it out. Silence about a thing just magnifies it. It grows and festers in silence, becomes malignant.”

Maggie addresses her and Brick’s marital problems—specifically, the silence surrounding Brick’s relationship with Skipper. However, this quote speaks to all the characters’ preferred method of dealing with problems—by avoiding and concealing them. Many characters prefer silence because their secrets are considered “unacceptable,” like death or attraction to members of the same sex. Additionally, the use of the word “malignant” echoes Big Daddy’s cancer and later assertion that his spastic colon originates from the lies surrounding his life—suggesting silence does cause illness.

“Hell, do they ever know it? Nobody says, ‘You’re dying.’ You have to fool them. They have to fool themselves. […]

Because human beings dream of life everlasting, that’s the reason! But most of them want it on earth and not in heaven.”

Maggie explains to Brick that lies are necessary because humans are unable to face their impending death. This is the first of many instances in which death is referred to as something which must be avoided being spoken about at all costs.